Expert Warns: Don`t Swallow Bundy`s Line

February 5, 1989|By DR. WILLIAM WILBANKS

The public has always been fascinated with serial killer Ted Bundy. His life and killings have been described in five books and a TV movie. Bundy is the man we love to hate. We are revulsed by the number of his victims (perhaps as many as 100); by the viciousness of his attacks (e.g., the beating and biting of the FSU Chi Omega victims) and by his choice of victims (beautiful young women and even a 12-year-old girl).

But we also have come to hate Bundy for the arrogance displayed at his trials and for the sneer on his face that seemed to communicate a contempt for society in general, as well as for his victims. Maybe that is why the public was so fascinated by the ``Bundy interview`` played on TV on Jan. 25, the day after his execution. Bundy was interviewed by Dr. James Dobson, an evangelical psychologist and crusader against pornography. The 30-minute (edited) interview showed Bundy without his familiar sneer, apparently contrite and anxious to provide a public service by warning of the dangers of pornography.

I have been surprised and disturbed by the ready acceptance of the Bundy interview ``message.`` The public seems to believe that a great deal of criminological significance should be given to statements ``straight from the horse`s mouth,`` especially when the words are part of a ``death-bed confession.`` As a criminologist, I would like to issue some notes of caution to those who swallowed whole the Bundy interview.

First, criminologists know that when one goes ``straight to the horse`s mouth`` one is more likely to get what comes out of the other end of the horse than some objective truth. The naive view that Bundy`s interview reveals the true causes of his murderous behavior wrongly assumes that Bundy knows the ``real reasons`` for his behavior and that he would reveal those reasons to us if he knew them.

The criminal`s view of the causes of his own behavior is likely to be far less accurate than that of observers, since his own view is biased by an elaborate set of rationalizations. Bundy wanted to believe that some alien force (pornography) was responsible for his killings rather than that he was an evil person who chose to do wrong. By placing the blame on porn, Bundy absolved himself of personal responsibility and portrayed himself as a victim of porn. His suggestion that he was not trying to avoid responsibility was either a self-deception or a final ``con`` on the public he so despises. Bundy`s failure to look the interviewer in the eye during his ``confession`` would lend support to the ``con`` explanation.

Second, the interviewer had a clear bias that distorted the interview. Bundy had been corresponding with Dobson for a year and was receptive to Dobson`s suggestion that his violent acts were caused by pornography. The correspondence between the two likely was similar to the ``coaching`` of a witness by an attorney. I am not suggesting that Dobson consciously coached Bundy, but his crusade against porn clearly biases his view of cause and makes it likely that he elicited and reinforced the responses from Bundy that would promote his cause and absolve Bundy of responsibility. The message of the interview thus was a quid pro quo (tradeoff) for Bundy and Dobson.

Third, the research literature does not support the Bundy message about the danger of porn. Clearly, depictions of violence can lead (in some individuals) to violent acts, but violent pornography is dangerous only because it is violent. There is no evidence that porn (i.e., ``dirty pictures``), apart from depictions of violence, causes violence. Dobson was simply trying to tie his ``pet evil`` (porn) to the violent acts of Ted Bundy to promote his crusade against soft-porn. The ``porn leads to violence`` theory was promoted by the Reagan/Meese Commission on Pornography (of which Dobson was a member) but has been rejected by the very researchers quoted by the commission.

Fourth, the Bundy message about the dangers of porn carries the label of ``addiction`` to the point of absurdity. Bundy told Dobson he was ``addicted`` to porn, thus suggesting that somehow his behavior was uncontrollable. The term ``addiction`` first was used to describe the drug habit, but now we are being told that there are gambling addicts, sex addicts, food addicts, shopping addicts, chocolate addicts, etc. It is to be hoped that the extension of the term to Bundy`s preoccupation with porn will lead the public to re-evaluate the accuracy of this label.

Joel Norris (in Serial Killers: The Growing Menace) has even suggested that (all?) serial killers are the victims of the ``disease of serial murder.`` Both the disease model and the addiction label equate uncontrolled behavior (murders) with uncontrollable behavior. I have no doubt that Norris would have elicited ``proof`` of ``serial killer-itis`` if given the same interview opportunity as Dobson.